Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë

Many people now would pick up a book from the 19th century and immediately scoff at the language and morals of those past times but little do they know how minute the differences are in the trials that people face today as they did then. Jane Eyre in her lifetime confronted situations that challenged her morals, her integrity and her belief in servitude to God. Men and women alike still encounter these same tests in modern times and the understanding of Jane’s struggles would be of great pertinence in their lives.
Jane Eyre is first and foremost a tale of a woman on a quest to be truly loved, not only romantically, but to be wanted and valued. Throughout her pursuit of love, though, Jane must learn a very hard lesson; how to truly love and still retain your autonomy. This life lesson is most clearly exemplified as Jane’s motivation to refuse Mr. Rochester while he remains married under church and state to Bertha Mason. Jane was given the decision to sacrifice her integrity for a life as Rochester’s admitted mistress or break her own heart and leave him. Her morals were clear in their direction but that did not make her choice any less painful. In the end her autonomy won out and she walked away from love. Alternatively, her life at Moor House stimulates her in its independence and dignity but refuses her emotional sustenance. In both circumstances Jane is looking for the satisfaction of the fulfilment of emotional needs as well as moral understanding. This same disturbance is present in people’s lives of the 21st century as everybody wants to be loved and no one wishes to sacrifice their personal beliefs in order to be valued.
Similarly, Jane undergoes the unbalance of another aspect of her life in that she is often confronted with the struggle between satiating her earthly desires and fulfilling her spiritual obligations. Jane encounters three main tests of her choice between human wants and moral duties in three different people. Mr. Brocklehurst, Helen Burns and St John Rivers all offer Jane a religious life in order to fully express her devotion to God. Brocklehurst’s is Jane’s easiest to reject in his strict black and white view of right and wrong under the guise of religious purging. Helen Burns also recommends a dissatisfactory view of life with God as something passive and far too submissive for a character as strong as Jane. St John Rivers, however, proposes a much more difficult choice in which Jane is again met with an option of love. She must choose a dutiful life of devotion devoid of real love or uncertainty in a search for her emotional longings. This is the most strenuous challenge of her faith in that her Christian mores and mortal desires are conflicting. In opposition to her first choice, Jane in this instance chooses the hope of possible love over her religious vocations.
The conflict between spiritual duties and human wants is incredibly relevant to people now as they’re faced with the chance to reject past customs of strong religious beliefs and obligations. Science has taken a hold of the church as recent trends indicate that there is a massive loss in faith within the modern world. Jane had to choose between mortal and spiritual desires and she clearly chose her earthly life while still vowing to maintain a deep commitment to her faith. This balance that she imposed in her life is pertinent as people in the modern world are attempting to make the same choice between two lives and are seeking the balance Jane achieved.
Furthermore, Jane Eyre examines the difficulty women faced in the 19th century as the ‘fairer sex’. There was the deep-seated belief in society that women were inferior to men and, therefore, deserved less out of life. Jane best expresses her detestation of these principles in Chapter 12; “Women are supposed to be very calm generally: but women feel just as men feel; they need exercise for their faculties, and a field for their efforts as much as their brothers do; they suffer from too rigid a restraint, too absolute a stagnation, precisely as men would suffer; and it is narrow-minded in their more privileged fellow-creatures to say that they ought to confine themselves to making puddings and knitting stockings, to playing on the piano and embroidering bags. It is thoughtless to condemn them, or laugh at them, if they seek to do more or learn more than custom has pronounced necessary for their sex.” It is an unfortunate idea that the modern world would have had yet to progress past such cultures in which people were prejudiced against others based on gender but in such instances the discussion of a male-driven society would be of much importance, such as Jane Eyre.
The classics of the 19th century and beyond can be considered outdated and of no attraction to modern readers and, yet, upon examination, there are indeed still stalwart connections between the problems and challenges encountered by characters such as Jane Eyre and the people of modern society. In a world where everyone wants all the newest gadgets and lives with everything at their fingertips, it’s comforting to know that not all that much has changed about the humans of this planet; they still want the same things: to be loved and to have balance, just as those that may have known the Brontë Sisters, Charles Dickens or Jane Austen.

[This is the essay I wrote about Jane Eyre for my English class]

My Place by Sally Morgan

I grew up in Washington State, the Pacific Northwest of the United States, and in our history classes we studied Colonial America and Africa. Therefore, I only had the information my mother gave me about Aboriginal suffering.
You can be sure that upon my arrival into an Australian history class I was blown away by how much I absolutely did not know about Aboriginal oppression in Australia. My history teacher made quick work of introducing us to the racist discrimination that "white Australia" employed against the native Australians. To further impress upon us the devastation government policies and social rejection created within Aboriginal communities, she wrote us an assignment focused around Sally Morgan's My Place.
She couldn't have chosen a better way to show us how the people we read about and the suffering written about in our textbooks was real and it actually happened with actual consequences.
Sally Morgan grew up completely separate from her natural culture and heritage and was left with a feeling of emptiness that she could never explain. As soon as she began to ask questions it became clear that her family was involved in a cover-up; a cover-up of the very thing that tore apart her family and the families of so many other Aborigines; a racist society with the intention of eliminating the culture of the land.
Though My Place isn't written with the highest sophistication or professional writing structure, the stories and the power of them is not lost in the least bit. Every Australian should read about how social and government pressure took a toll on an entire culture in order to accept responsibility and to most past this disgracefull period in Australian history as a whole, united nation.

The Drowning People by Richard Mason

Everyone alive today will or has already felt the haunt of growing old. We’ll all tremble at the thought of regrets and maybe even fear the sweeping hand of death. When we approach the end we will all look back on our lives, pose ‘what if’s to ourselves and wonder what would, should, could have been. The aging James Farrell is no different from us. He knows his time is coming; His judgement day is dawning. He also knows that what has happened has happened and no amount of urging will make his younger self choose a different path when entering the crossroads of life.
When James was twenty-one years old he was just breaking into life. He was embarking on an existence separate from the one he had shared with his parents for so long and he was finally becoming the man he had been waiting to turn into. There was no way he could have seen how life changing his meeting Ella in the park could be for him. Maybe if he had seen the devastating outcome he wouldn’t have sat down on the bench with her and maybe he wouldn’t have let himself be pulled into her tornado of family politics and hatred spanning generations. Unfortunately, all James saw was a gorgeous woman alone and seemingly distressed and, being the young man that he was, he couldn’t just pass up this opportunity. So began the downward spiral of young James’s life. But how was he to know?
The Drowning People is told from elderly James’s memories of all the events that led to his eventual and fatal punishment of his wife, Sarah. Due to the strange inner workings of the human mind, some of James’s memories are blurry and undefined while others that seem far less important are bizarrely sharp and distinct but what stands above all else is the truth and his firm belief that we will all be punished in the end.
Richard Mason constructs an extraordinary story with resounding themes of family, trust, hatred, justice and the overwhelming influence of love. The characters’ lives intertwine flawlessly and yet their very connections seem to be the cause of their eventual downfalls. At some times told in a voice dripping with regret and others times with a superiority that one could only feel when they’ve reached the end, The Drowning People exhibits Robert Mason’s expertise in the fields of human regret and that urge to reach back in time to just explain to your younger self all the things they should have known before they had to make the decisions of their lives. It’s spectacular writing with a haunting underlying reality.

Talk Dirty: Yiddish by Ilene Schneider

Some people absolutely adore trains while others are crazy about insects. Some love puzzles and others live for sports. We all have the one thing that really gets us going, the one thing we hold above all of our other passions. Mine just happens to be language, all of it. Spoken, written, foreign, colloquial, I love it all. I find it utterly fascinating that the linear patterns we put onto a page can weave through our thoughts and create such overwhelming reality that we positively forget that which is physical and what only lives in our imaginations. I also find it intriguing that throughout our worldly languages there are reoccurring phrases and sayings that take root in countries we may not even be able to locate on a globe. Their etymology ranges from a simple folk tale to an epic battle that has spanned generations.
My older brother recently came to visit my family as well as attend a friend’s wedding in our area of residence. During his stay, he came into the knowledge that a good friend of mine practices the Jewish faith. Being the absolute hilarity that he is, my brother sent for my birthday Talk Dirty: Yiddish so as to “entertain my Jewish friends.” Little did he know that my Jewish friend speaks Hebrew or that I would actually appreciate the opportunity to learn about a language and a culture that I know very little about. Ilene Schneider is one of only six female rabbis in America and jumped at the suggestion of writing about the colloquial street language of the Yiddish speaking population. Not only is this book a naughty word dictionary, it also provides a history of Yiddish and Jewish people as well as an etymology for many of the sayings and popular phrases within the Yiddish culture.
Written clearly and with plenty of very useful explanation, Talk Dirty: Yiddish was one of the most educational and truly beguiling gag gifts I’ve ever received and I would definitely recommend it to anyone wishing to learn about their roots or merely to swear in public and not get reprimanded.

Beyond the Glass by Antonia White

Clara Batchelor is a well-brought-up, upper class, Catholic girl from a highly respected family and recently got married to a charming young man of just as high a social stature. There’s only one problem; Archie can’t have children. The newlyweds decide quickly that the only way for either of them to be happy is to get the marriage annulled. Clara’s family doesn’t agree quite as much as she’d hoped but the church will agree to an annulment and that’s all that matters. Clara is then left to move back into her old life with her parents in her childhood London home.
As Clara become aware of the hole she has fallen into, trapped within the walls she had been so eager to leave, she begins to go completely mad. Slowly at first but with the precipitous interruption and additional complication that is Richard, she falls further and further into insanity.
The twists and turns that her thoughts take are startling and give us a basic and harrowing understanding of the make-up of the human mind and the boundaries that it invariably has.
The third and final story in a trilogy, Beyond the Glass is a fascinating examination of a mind falling apart at the seams. Told with easy to follow sequence and clarity of understanding this book was a rather curious insight into what a mind goes through with such added stress and the utter ease in which it all will crumble. The pace of the story was somewhat irregular with the beginning stretching out and the ending rushing in far too quickly. The final chapters also leave you wondering if Beyond the Glass really is the last volume in the series.
A definite “must read” if you’re looking into the human psyche, but otherwise Beyond the Glass is a little too tough of a story for the gently browsing type.

Bloodstain: the Vanishing of Peter Falconio by Richard Shears

Most people know the old saying “Truth is stranger than fiction.” The accuracy of that statement becomes abundantly clear when you compare your classic fictional murder mystery with the real life one in Bloodstain.
Along a barren stretch of the Stuart Highway in the outback of Australia, a woman hails a truck driven by two everyday truckies and hysterically demands that they help her find her boyfriend. This seemingly ordinary night in July 2001 throws the entire world deep into a “whodunit” the likes of which they’d never seen.
From the very beginning, Joanne Lees's story of what happened when the caravan that her and her boyfriend, Peter Falconio, were travelling in across Australia got held up at gunpoint seems like something out of a horror movie. Slowly, people begin to notice the cracks in her witness account. But just as slowly, Joanne changes her story, filling up the cracks only to create others that she simply has no explanation for.
Where’s Peter’s body? Why did her attacker’s description change so drastically from her original portrayal? How did she get from the front of the truck to the back? Why is there such a lack of physical evidence that proves there was someone else around during her so called hold up? All of these questions and absolutely no answers.
Maybe she’s suffering from shock and she just honestly can’t remember the exact details of that horrifying night. But then, maybe her missing boyfriend isn’t as shocking or unexpected as she claims.
As it stands now, the courts and the legal system have stood by Joanne’s side and put her accused attacker, Brad Murdoch, behind bars but maybe it’s not as easy as that. The twists and turns of truth in this saga are bound to cause most people to raise their eyebrows and question the credibility of the end result.
A real life detective novel that demands you to question every little ‘fact’, Bloodstain is a read for those of us who don’t always like to see a happy ending and enjoy a few loose ends.

The Day of the Triffids by John Wyndham

When my History teacher began the subject of the Cold War, she came up with a rather creative idea to help us fully understand the constant threat of the nuclear war that was present and how devastating such an event would be. She then gave us a list of sci-fi novels that revolved around this given topic and they included titles such as Taronga by Victor Kelleher, Brother in the Land by Robert Swindells and Z for Zachariah by Robert O'Brien but the one that really sparked my interest was The Day of the Triffids.
Based in modern day London after a stunning nighttime comet show that left the entire world blind, this story follows the experiences of a man that was spared from the tragedy on his quest to find and then survive with his new found love.
The pair soon find that they'll have to face harder obstacles than the stench of the blind that were left to die, but they'll come up against gangs, food shortages and, more so than anyone thought possible, the triffids.
A freak, mutant plant with unknown origins that people originally thought were rather harmless, when they're stingers were cut off of course, adapt frighteningly fast to the sudden fall of human superiority and begin to seek their revenge. Taking over towns and surrounding the survivors, the triffids seem to "learn" the ways of their victims and make the necessary adjustments.
With the world slowly deteriorating around them, Bill and Josella are left to wonder aimlessly about the "why"s of their situation. Why did this happen? Why now? Why aren't we blind as well? They begin to come to the conclusion that maybe the comets weren't an act of God, but a grotesque accident brought on by their very own mankind. Of course, they'll never know the real reason and they'll never get the answers to their questions but in this hideous new lifestyle that they must face, what else are they to think?
Told with startling clarity and intelligence, The Day of the Triffids is one of the best sci-fis I've ever read which is a rare compliment due to my general dislike of the genre. Definitely something out of this world, the story is worth the read and a must for all fans of scientific mutation.